Letter 275: What happened was just as you predicted in your letter.

To Leontius. (358) What you wrote to me about happened: at first I was glad to see Cleopater on account of your letter, but when I made trial of the young man, I could not but feel reverence for the letter, and I was drawn more strongly by the qualities that came from himself. For he appeared to me good at forming a judgment of a speech, and the rhetorical skill in the things he writes he made plain by the things he ran through in conversation. Moreover, he gratified me both by his love for you, and by his delight in the things which he reported that you say about me, and in the things which he heard from me about you. And then again the grace that was in his face and in his voice and in his bearing, and in short there was nothing about him that was not of this kind. Such a kinsman you wrought for us along with his nature, adding what is yours to the things that came from her. May you indeed beget children too who are like this kinsman.

Λεοντίῳ. (358) Ἔπαθον ὃ ἐπέσταλκας· εὐθὺς μὲν ἡδέως τὸν Κλεόπατρον εἶδον διὰ τὴν ἐπιστολήν, πειρώμενος δὲ τοῦ νεανίσκου τὴν μὲν ἐπιστολὴν οὐκ εἶχον μὴ αἰδεῖσθαι, τοῖς παρ’ αὐτοῦ δὲ πλέον εἱλκόμην. κρίνειν τε γάρ μοι λόγον ἀγαθὸς ἐφαίνετο καὶ τὴν ἐν οἷς γράφει ῥητορικὴν οἶς λαλῶν ἔτρεχε παρεδήλου. καὶ μὴν τῷ τε σὲ φιλεῖν ἐχαρίζετό μοι τῷ τε χαίρειν οἷς τε σὲ περὶ ἐμοῦ λέγειν ἤγγελλεν οἷς τε ἤκουεν ἐμοῦ περὶ σοῦ. τὸ δ’ αὖ χάριεν ἔν τε τῷ προσώπῳ καὶ τῷ φθέγματι καὶ τοῖς σχήμασι καὶ ὅλως οὐδὲν ὃ μὴ τοιοῦτον ἦν. τοιοῦτον ἡμῖν μετὰ τῆς φύσεως ἀπειργάσω τὸν συγγενῆ τοῖς παρ’ ἐκείνης τὰ σὰ προσθείς. ἐργάσαιο δὴ καὶ παῖδας τῷ συγγενεῖ παρα- πλησίους.